I looked at the passport, and then back up at the woman standing in front of me.
"Are you serious?" I asked, a puzzled look on my face.
She looked sad.
"What is to be funny?" she said, her broken English somehow endearing.
"I don't know how they do things in..." I turned her passport over, and looked at the country name listed. It took up three lines, and many of the letters just looked like squiggles to me. "...your home country, but over here we do things differently."
"Is me!" she smiled, and I felt my tough exterior melting...
"This is your fault," his wife said to him. If you would just put your mother in her place I wouldn't have to and we wouldn't be fighting right now.
He replied loudly, "My fault? How is it my fault she's nosy? She doesn't mean anything by it anyway. You don't have to be such a bitch about every little thing."
"Oh. My. God. Seriously?" She was on a roll now. "It's your fault she's so nosy because you never say anything at all to her when she crosses a line. And once again, I wouldn't have to be such...
Heather had never found her talent.
The smallest amount of knitting made her arms feel like they'd fall from her shoulders. Her paintings looked like they'd been crafted by a toddler. Even decoupage, just gluing paper onto things to decorate them, seemed beyond her reach; in every project the images were wrinkled and unattractive. What was she doing wrong? Time and time again she struggled to release her creative genius, the one she had been told lived inside each and every person, but evidently she preferred to stay hidden deep inside.
Standing on the bridge, she watched the churning waters...
Malcolm's coo became a cry.
The child peeked into the cardboard box, vexation clearly etched etched upon his face. "What's the matter, little bird?" he asked, reaching down to stroke the wounded pigeon. His mother had warned him to stay away, that sometimes birds would bite and a wild bird like Malcolm could carry diseases. He didn't care. He wanted to stroke his back feathers, far enough back that the bird's beak couldn't reach his pudgey fingers... just in case.
"David! Stay away from that bird!" his mother called.
The boy yanked his finger back just as the pigeon lunged...
It's midnight and we're sitting on the roof and your hand is on my knee and I'm leaning my head on your shoulder and you're saying something about the stars, about how bright they are, about how they look the same on the other side of the world, something cliche like that. But they don't, do that? I hear a door slam from somewhere inside and I can feel you flinch. You're not supposed to be here, I guess. You think I've got someone else, but I don't. He broke up with me yesterday morning, on the front lawn as...
It was the fall that surprised me most.
I guessed the weight and the distance. It is easy really once you think about it, I guess easy for me at least or at least it was easy, once.
I scrapped up the side of my leg and sometimes that takes longer to heal now that I am older, but being alone who cares really.
It is a good story to tell if anyone is listening.
It was the fall that surprised me most. It is never expected I suppose. One thinks that you will always be quick, cute, desirable. Always...
Peasants. That's what I thought when I looked out the window. Nothing but peasants on the street below. Uneducated people. I watched as one of them gave birth. Immediately, she put her baby in a tree. There was a bees' nest there and the bees stung the baby. Even from up here I could hear the baby scream. The baby fell out of the tree. I think it broke a leg because it didn't move after that. The baby just cried and screamed and ate fig newtons. It bled too. A lot.
Slowly, I ate my Almond Joy bar.
Gweedo,...